


Dancing (with your ghost)

by Nagiru



Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: (or not so mild), (that was... not the tag I was going for but. I mean. Ish?), Emotional Hurt, Gen, I don't know if this would be considered "Hurt/No Comfort"..., So... the usual, Some angst, The Doctor is Hurt (Doctor Who), but it isn't "Hurt/Comfort" either tbf, oh. guess this is important to tag:, post-timeless children, some mentions of Academy Era relationship between Doctor and Master, some mild denial, the Doctor is dwelling in her thoughts..., which is somewhat happy. but also pretty bittersweet.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:42:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25869862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nagiru/pseuds/Nagiru
Summary: Because one of them doesn't exist anymore. And the other might never have existed. But those memories still remain, in the end, whether she wants them to or not.(she does)
Relationships: The Doctor & The Master (Doctor Who)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 7





	Dancing (with your ghost)

**Author's Note:**

> I was listening to "Dancing With Your Ghost" by Sasha Sloan and this just. Well. Popped up in my mind. And since I've been in a bit of a writer's block I decided, "what the hell, why not?"... so. You know what? Why not?! ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> (I kinda wrote this imagining the Doctor and the Master having had a romantic relationship in the past but. I'll be honest: it's not actually specified in the story, so if you prefer them to be anything else... well. Anything else it is.)
> 
> Of course, as always: I write for pleasure only, there's no lucrative intention from this; also, Doctor Who and characters are not mine. (Otherwise, those two would _totally_ be in a relationship... while still being "Complicated", tbf)

She tilted her head back, the melody drumming away around her yet again. It was nothing quite _conscious_ , it just… happened. Every night. Or, well, every time that passed as night time in the TARDIS. Every time she felt herself slow down, every time she paused for just a bit too long…

The same melody. The same symphony she knew like— the same symphony she knew as if it were part of her _soul_.

In a way, she supposed it was. A melody that resonated so strongly and _deeply_ that she would never, ever be capable of forgetting, not even during her most confusing times, right after regenerating.

And every night, it would come up. Drumming away from the walls surrounding her, echoing hauntingly from the back of her mind. A melody without words but full of _something_.

A melody that always made her think of days long gone, of memories she didn’t even know if she could trust anymore. And every time, it always left her… unmoored. Energized. Petrified.

It was… it was the sound of children running through the red grasses, it was the sound of dreaming about the stars above, it was the sound of hands clenched tight around one another, it was the sound of fever and devotion and happiness. It was the sound of hearts, four hearts, beating away together, fear and excitement and the silliness of secrets brimming within. It was the sound of safety, of comfort, of nights spent under the same covers trying to pretend the world around them did not exist.

It was the sound of two beings twisted so tightly together they couldn’t even be differentiated from one another.

And each night, the melody would burn within and she would — would do this. Allow it to rush through her, allow her body to move without her input, allow her mind to… wander. Just for one night.

Just for one _more_ night.

Just one (more) night of being okay, of being _fine_ — just a tad bit sadder than those around her, perhaps, but _fine_. Just one (more) night of dancing around with someone that didn’t exist anymore.

With someone that perhaps had never existed at all.

Strange how those were two different people. But, in those moments, when she was just _moving_ … in those moments, when the melody was all she could hear and the memories were all that occupied her mind… in those moments, she allowed herself to forget that perhaps, _perhaps_ it was herself that was the ghost, in those memories.

In those moments where her TARDIS started the melody again and she found herself reciprocating, she thought that… perhaps… it _was_ conscious after all.

Perhaps she _did_ choose the song, every single night.

Because when the alternative was dwelling in the darkness that brewed underneath all the smiles and hope and happiness she forced up every day?

The choice wasn’t hard at all.


End file.
